Sony PSP Handheld Entertainment System

It's on. Sony's long-awaited PSP has hit the market with a nice lineup of …

Visual audio sensory theater

I'm too sexy for my PSP

The thing that surprised me after playing with my PSP for a while and showing it to people was the initial reaction everyone had to the system. People seem to be almost afraid of it. The face is a glossy black color, dominated by that gigantic screen. It looks ready to break right out of the box. I heard that over and over when people held it for the first time. "I feel like I'm going to break it," or "I don't want to touch it." While the DS looks inviting, the open-face design of the PSP seems almost intimidating to most people. It looks high tech, complicated, and beautiful.

Sexy (image courtesy of Sony)

Crank up the volume

The biggest disappointment with the PSP has to be the onboard speakers. They're utterly terrible. They're too quiet, and the sound is thin and tinny when you crank it up. This failure melts away when you plug a good set of headphones though. The PSP can crank out some very, very good sounding music and effects in games. I'm glad we finally get listenable music inside our portable games. Until this point I used to just turn the sound all the way down on my GameBoys. While it's nice that the PSP has such great sound through headphones, it's a shame the speakers are so terrible. This is in stark contrast to the rich, full sound you get out of the stock speakers on the DS.

A beautiful fingerprint magnet

The fanboys would have you believe that the screen is the greatest thing since sliced bread, and it truly is a thing to behold. It's large, sharp, and bright. The colors pop, and black is very black. The first time you see one of these in action you will be impressed with it, no question. Watching the included Spiderman 2 UMD looks as good as ? if not better than ? the DVD release. The screen is not without its problems though; there is a noticeable blurring and ghosting effect with certain colors and swift movement on the screen. While not annoying in most cases it IS there, and it can get distracting in certain games. There's also the issue of dead pixels, but we'll get to that later.

All in all the PSP has the best screen I've ever seen on any handheld period. It beats out the other portable systems, portable DVD players, PDAs, you name it. The screen is amazing, and instantly impressive. Just be sure to invest in headphones ? a game that relies on sound just isn't going to be nearly as fun with the speakers as it is with headphones. Lumines with a good set of cans is gaming nirvana.

The other thing I have to bring up, because everyone remarks on it, is that you'll spend about five minutes wiping the screen for every two minutes playing. The screen is a magnet for smudges, fingerprints, dust, and it all shows up on the screen while playing. I guess that cleaning cloth that comes with the Value Pack isn't such a waste after all; this is not the system for people with OCD.

You can't pick it up without leaving giant greasy smudges on the screen, no matter how often you wash your hands or how careful you are. Expect people to take one look at your PSP and think you're a dirty, dirty little boy.

Taking a charge

The matter of battery life was widely discussed prior to launch, to the point where we were expecting less than two hours of playtime on a single charge. The truth is of course more complicated: different things tax the battery in different ways. If you're watching video on a UMD you can deplete your battery in under three hours; spinning the disc and powering the laser kills it.

If you have video on a memory stick you can get over seven hours if you don't have the screen on the highest setting. A game like Lumines, a puzzle game, will give you more battery life than the full splendor of Wipeout Pure.

The bottom line? On average I'm getting about five hours of battery life per charge. Turn the WiFi off, drop the screen down brightness level (it's the display button beneath the screen) and you get respectable, if still somewhat disappointing battery life. After-market chargers and battery packs will help to alleviate this problem, and since the battery pack is removable (unlike the screwed-in DS battery) it's easy to pop the back off the case and put in a new one.

I've heard multiple rumors of Sony later releasing a longer lasting battery, and if that happens I would suggest getting one and keeping the original. That way, with swapping batteries, 10 hours isn't out of the question.